Alexia Kirby

"My nights are drenched in long talks with myself about how things should've been but couldn't be." - Faraway

It's him. The bed smells as such.

I usually turn in my sleep a little bit but tonight I'm trying to keep still. It's hard because my mind is everywhere but being on a happy dream, instead, it's somewhere else.

"No stop please!" I beg, sobbing as I slowly crouch closer and closer to the ground until I'm kneeling on the ground. " No! This is his fault!" He shouts. His strong and loud voice booms through the air. I'm scared. Dexter wraps his arms around me trying to shield me. "You will leave her alone. But take me." He demands. " No!" I sob and place my head in his arms further. He can't leave. I need him, I don't want to be alone here. Everything is blurry and way too loud when a loud ringing bursts through the air, and someone has been shot.

I open my eyes from the memory.  Breathing heavily and sweating. The voice is  still echoing around me. His voice still haunts me. It's happening again. It always does, I remember these times more than I'd like. I thought I didn't need my medicine so mom took me off but I do, I can't tell her though. Only Dexter knows I still have trouble with the memories and with my Schizophrenia.

I lift my head up to look around the room next to me and see Raven asleep all the way on the other side of the bed. I carefully get out of bed and sit on the floor to put on my socks and then I go to the door and carefully open it and slip out into the hall and close the door.

I lean over the railing as I breathe out loudly. I grip the railing a bit more because now I'm starting to shake and a few stray tears are falling down my face due to the memory that surfaced. I breathe out slow deep breaths to not overwhelm myself as more tears start to flow.

I go through the same motions breathing in and out deeply while closing and opening my hand on the railing till I'm calmer. I have a list, a list of special things I do when I have attacks like this so I don't break down. First is calming breaths and centering thoughts, then stress pressure and calming thoughts , if it gets bad I talk about my feelings out loud and list what I'm feeling if it gets past that then tracing or as I say sensory focusing. The voices are gone but my paranoia is pretty high so I won't be getting to sleep anytime soon.

I blink away the tears that had crowded my eyes before staring off downstairs where the marble floors have small shine spots in the midst of the darkness. The darkness where people could lark. He could be.

No, he's not here.

I need water. I slowly let go of the railing getting my balance together and started taking shaky steps toward where I remember the kitchen to be. I found out earlier when Beatrix showed me because I got thirsty before I laid down for bed. The house is somewhat dimly lit so I can find my way. As I get closer to the kitchen I can see the lights are on inside.

I feel as if I could throw up.

I enter through the archway and find Kenan sitting at the curved island drinking some amber-colored liquid. I walk in and head for the refrigerator and take out a bottle of Voss water. " Are you okay? You look a little shaken up?" Kenan's voice breaks the silence of the house. " I have a mild anxiety attack and needed water. Why are you up?" I say, as I close the refrigerator and open my water. " Sometimes I have insomnia and I tend to have an active head and get caught in my thoughts." Kenan explains, before sipping his drink and I glance down at it. " It's not alcohol. I don't drink. It's apple juice." Kenan informs me and I nod before drinking my water. I finish and walk around the counter to sit beside Kenan.

"Do you wanna talk about it?" I ask. "Nah, I'd just overthink it later. You?" He answers.  "No." I answer. " Well, we can always just sit here and be here for each other." Kenan tells me and I turn and look at him to find him looking at me. I give him a small smile. " Thank you, for the company." He says. " No problem." I reply.

Me and Kenan end up just sitting there drinking our drinks and occasionally talking about small things.

"What are you two doing up?" Grayson's voice comes from the entrance of the kitchen. "Insomnia." Kenan replies. " Bad dream. You?" I say. "Bad dream." Grayson states. Grayson walks in and goes to the fridge pulling out water before closing it and leaning back onto the counter. "Same thing." Kenan says looking at Grayson and he nods.

What's same thing mean? It's probably none of my business.

"You can always sleep in the guest room if mine is too crowded for you." Grayson says, directed toward Kenan. " Thanks, I think I'm gonna go play basketball for a little while." Kenan says, getting up from his seat and rinsing out his glass before putting it in the dishwasher. " Thank you, Alexia. Goodnight guys." Kenan says. " Goodnight Kenan."I reply. " Night." Grayson says.

"What was your dream about?" I ask Grayson. I probably shouldn't but I'm too curious for my own good. Grayson lets out a sigh before pushing himself off of the island. Grayson doesn't say anything for a moment but then he opens his mouth, " My sister. I have these dreams sometimes where I leave he starts taking his anger out on her. I know he's hard on me and her but I take most of the heat so she can at least go to normal high school and not always put on runways and billboards for new tv shows he wants her in."

"I'm sorry." I say and he shrugs. " It's fine, what was your bad dream?" He asks.  " Bad memory. I don't want to talk about it though." I answer. Grayson looks down at his hand and removes one of his rings. This one is gold and it has a black stripe going around the middle. " Here, this is an anxiety ring. I play with it sometimes when I get scared, nervous, or mad. It helps. The black part spins." Grayson says holding it out for me.  " I can't. It seems like you need it." I tell him. " I have three more. You need this one more than I do." Grayson says and sits it on the counter in front of me. I smile at him and pick it and test which finger it fits on.

The left pointer fits.

"Perfect. Now it's yours." Grayson says.

Me and Grayson sit in silence till we are both done. We even have a snack and then we go look outside to check on Kenan.

"Is he going to be okay?" I ask. " Yeah, he's been like this for a while. He's just going through some things." Grayson answers. Kenan is putting his all into this game. He's focused. He looks almost like a robot playing than a person having fun. " He's been through some things." I say. " Haven't we all? We all have our demons and battles, Just some are longer lasting than others." Grayson replies. " That's very brilliant of you to say." I tell him. " I'm pretty smart sometimes." Grayson says and I laugh a little.

"Come on, I want to do something." Grayson says and motions for me to follow him.

***

We ended up in the front yard. Grayson grabbed a blanket on the way out and laid it down on the ground outside and gestured for me to get on it. "The stars may not be great but sometimes I like to play connect the dots with them." Grayson explains. We both lay down and look up at the stars. It's slightly hard to see them but we still connect all the dots we can till I figure it's been about an hour.

"Do you think you're ready for bed?" He asks. "Yes." I agree.

We both get up and Grayson folds up the blanket and we both stop by the restroom before heading upstairs and finding Raven spread all over the bed so I decided to just sleep with him on his insanely big couch.

I'm sure we can sleep close to each other and not kill each other. At least for one night. We lay shoulder to shoulder staring up at the night sky through his glass ceiling. " This is my favorite spot in my room." He whispers to me. " Why? I whisper back. " I like stars, as you saw earlier." He replies.

We lay there just looking up and he tells me about constellations he finds and then says their name, while I lean my head closer onto his shoulder and watch, without knowing it I fall asleep. This time I dream of good dreams. Dreams with Grayson in them.